In medical imaging, for example in X-ray mammography, transmission images of a region of interest of a patient, such as a breast, may be recorded by detecting X-rays that fall onto a sensor or detector after having passed the region of interest. After that these images may be displayed and a physician or similarly skilled person may decide, whether there are malignant or benign changes in the region of interest.
An X-ray imaging system may comprise an energy discriminating detector, i.e. a detector that is adapted for differentiating between X-rays of different energy and of recording images at different energy levels. For example, a dual energy detector may produce two energy images of exactly the same geometry and anatomical area.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,165,379 B2 shows a mammography system that is adapted to record low energy and high energy images.
Two complementing energy images may show information which may help to discriminate whether visible masses are likely malignant or benign. However, the way to compute malignancy features from the dual energy images is not yet clear.